Marinduque Vacation-An Alternative to Boracay, if Night Life is not required!

Planning to Retire Soon!

If you are planning to retire in the Philippines soon, I suggest you visit several excellent websites on pro's and cons of retiring in the Philippines. However if you want to retire in the provinces, where life is simple, standard of living cheaper, less traffic congestion and pollution, availability of fresh seafood and vegetables compared to the big cities, my island province is the place for you! If this is your first time in my site, welcome. Please do not forget to read the latest national and international news in the right side bar of this blog. Some of the photos and videos on this site, I do not own. However, I have no intention on the infringement of your copyrights. The photo above is the front yard of Chateau Du Mer-Our Retirement Home in Boac, Marinduque, Philippines

Saturday, June 9, 2012

Are you bored with FaceBook? "Airtime" may Relieve your Boredom

Recent news indicated that 30% of FB user are getting bored in using this social media site. One user commented that instead of checking his profile daily, he just check in on it once a week. He was ask why he is getting bored. He said FB newness has faded and to him it was just a passing fad. He wants something fresh and new. I tend to agree with the above member. So if 30% of the 900 million users of Facebook is bored, will this affect the stock price of FB? I will definitely agree, particularly if another social site can challenge FB domimance. In my article in Publish Us the other day, I posted eight sites that could challenge FB dominance. The sites are Twitter, LinkIn, Pinterst, Stumblr, Viddy, Google+ and two others sites that I have not heard before.

My dear readers what other features do you want to see in FB, besides posting pictures, sharing videos and playing games? In my case, I would like to see the chat option updated, so that you can see someone you are chatting with if you have a web cam, similar to Skype . This wish may have come true last Tuesday when Airtime was launched..Will this new feature relieve your boredom with FB?

The following article from NBC News, was just posted recently discussing Airtime?
Airtime, a browser-based video chat service, launched on Tuesday. It's shiny, new and created by Napster co-founders Sean Parker and Shawn Fanning. It's also prone to taking snapshots of your video chats and sending them to trained Airtime employees, who review them for inappropriate content.

Sounds somewhat creepy, right? That's what I thought, so I had a lengthy conversation with an Airtime spokesperson who broke down what happens in the background, while you use the service. The details will probably still leave you feeling a bit uneasy, but it's better to be informed and uncomfortable than to be caught completely off guard.
As you may know, Airtime is essentially a browser-based video chat service which relies on your Facebook identity. All you have to do is grab a webcam, head to the Airtime website and login using your Facebook account — no downloads or installations are required.

The service will allow you to video-chat with your Facebook friends or match up with strangers, based on location and shared Facebook interests. (Your identity isn't revealed to the strangers until you choose to share your name, mind you.) If you're not particularly charmed by your chat partner, you can simply click "next" and go on to the next one.

As we pointed out when we first covered Airtime, the service works a lot like Chatroulette — a site which randomly paired strangers up for video chats. The trouble with Chatroulette, of course, was that many users — ahem — exposed themselves on camera.
We speculated that Airtime might simply be hoping that associating its users' Facebook accounts — and in theory, their real identities — with their Airtime usage might discourage them from getting indecent. But there's oh-so-much-more to how Airtime is trying to avoid the so-called "Chatroulette penis problem."

Smile! You're in a snapshot!
Airtime's spokesperson tells me that the company invested significant amounts into the technology used to maintain user safety. In fact, the team dedicated to this task is by far its largest, by head count. A large portion of these Airtime employees are trained to analyze and evaluate abusive behavior — and to nip it in the bud.
According to Airtime, when you have a video chat with a stranger — meaning someone who is not one of your Facebook friends — the service quietly takes snapshots. How often these snapshots are taken is determined by an algorithm which assigns a risk percentage to each user, based on how likely he or she might be to engage in inappropriate behavior. (Factors used to determine this risk percentage include — but are not limited to — age, gender, location, and the time the service is being used.)

As soon as these snapshots are taken, the spokesperson tells me, they are analyzed by a number of automated filters, which check, among other things, for the presence of a face and the luminosity of the image. (The assumption is that you are theoretically more likely to be engaging in inappropriate behavior if you are sitting in a dimly lit room.) The Airtime spokesperson refrained from elaborating further on the nature of the other filters used to analyze snapshots, explaining that this could potentially compromise some of their effectiveness.
Wait — what did you say about someone looking at my video chats?
Any snapshots which are deemed to be showing potentially inappropriate behavior — which according to the Airtime terms of service includes nudity, violence, animal cruelty, drug use and more — are flagged and sent to the Airtime's Tier 1 safety team.

The trained professionals who make up this team are able to view the flagged snapshot as well as a user's snapshot history in order to best determine if he or she is engaging in inappropriate behavior. Though each snapshot is associated with an individual's Facebook user ID, Airtime assured us that safety reps are not able to view any other user information. If members of the Tier 1 safety team believe that a snapshot displays behavior which violates the service's terms of service, they will escalate it to the Tier 2 team. Members of this second team have additional training which will help them determine whether a user should be permanently banned from Airtime — and whether there is a need to notify authorities. The policy is "one strike and you're out," says the Airtime spokesperson.

Are Airtime bans really permanent?
There's currently no way to use Airtime without a Facebook account. So when a member of the service's safety team bans you, he or she is banning your Facebook identity. In theory, you could try to make a new Facebook account and use that to log back into Airtime, but there are roadblocks.
"You have to demonstrate social behavior before you can get on the site," explains the Airtime spokesperson. Just as a credit card company might look at your credit history, Airtime looks at your Facebook history in order to determine whether it will grant you access. If you do not have a minimum number of Facebook friends, you will not be able to get onto Airtime. This minimum friend threshold, among other factors, makes it more difficult for banned users to regain access to Airtime by simply creating new Facebook accounts.

How long does Airtime keep these snapshots ... and why?
Snapshots are stored indefinitely "for historical perspective" and to "detect abuse patterns," the Airtime spokesperson told me. This is, of course, outlined in the service's rather intimidating privacy policy.
This long term storage struck me as startling, so I asked Jeff Hermes — director of the Digital Media Law Project at Harvard University's Berkman Center for Internet and Society — for some perspective.
"When we talk about privacy concerns, the primary question we have is whether there is sufficient notice given to users about whether their information is going to be stored," he explained. "We review these issues from the perspective of whether there is a legal issue."

There you are my friends, FB has a new application to relieve your boredom. Welcome to Airtime!.

Chateau Du Mer Beach Resort and Conference Center

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ABOUT ME

I am a retired Filipino-American who loves writing, gardening and photography. My wife ( of 58 years) and I enjoy our snowbird lifestyle between US and the Philippines.

We have a small but very private beach resort (above video) in the beautiful island of Marinduque, Philippines. I have several blog sites (ten), a personal blog, blogs about retiring or visiting the Philippines and about our beach resort-CHATEAU DU MER.

Fruit Trees in the Gardens of Chateau Du Mer

The Mango Tree-I have three varieties in my Garden-The Indian, Guimaras and Carabao Mangoes
My caretaker/gardener informed me last month that due to the El Nino drought in Marinduque, two of my Durian trees died in spite of his vigilant watering. One of the tree was attacked by insects that looks like a big fly but yellowish in color that sucks the sap of the seedling. The roots of the other tree was attacked by ants residing in the soil. However, my other fruit trees, the rambutans( 2), the lanzones(2) and the jack fruits ( 2) trees are doing well. The above eight fruit trees were given to me by Retired General Recaredo Sarmiento of Boac and Lucena., about three years ago. General Sarmiento is the “atid” of my wife. “Atid” is the colloquial term for brother. Evidently, Macrine's father, the late Bernardo Jambalos was the Godfather of General Sarmiento during his baptism and comfirmation.
Gen Sarmiento's hobby is orchard planting, reforestation and farming.
The other fruit trees in my garden are guayabanos, cashew, avocados, starapples, duhats, ates, guavas, mangoes( 3 varieties) and papayas as well as several varieties of bananas . Of the above fruit trees, my favorite is the guayabanos, also known as soursop tree known for its anti-tumor and anti-cancer properties . The following are photos of the fruit trees. The Durian photo is from the web. Note that it almost look like a jack fruit tree, except that the leaves are bigger and shiny. My desire is to have a passion fruit tree in the near future. You are welcome to visit my orchard and flower gardens any time, if perchance you are in the vicinity of The Chateau Du Mer Beach Resort and Conference Center.
The Rambutan Tree and Fruits
The Lanzone Tree and Fruits
The Jack Fruit Tree
The Durian Fruit Tree

Disclaimer: Most of the photos and videos included in this blog are not owned by me unless stated. If you are the owner of the photo/video and you would like to be credited, please let me know and I will pay proper attribution after careful verification of your identity and of your 'claimed' image/s. The photos/videos used in this blog are results of myGoogle and other Internet searches. Thank you and if you enjoy this blog, help support it by clicking on the ads.

Marinduque Mainland from Tres Reyes Island

View of Mainland Marinduque from Tres Reyes Island-Click photo to link to Marinduque Awaits You